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CEDARVILLE
REVIEW
ii
EDITORS’ FOREWORD
“The beginning of human knowledge is through the senses, and the fiction writer begins where
human perception begins...the fact is, that the materials of the fiction writer are the humblest.
Fiction is made from everything human and we are made out of dust, and if you scorn getting
yourself dusty, then you shouldn’t try to write fiction.”
–Flannery O’Connor
At the Cedarville Review, we believe good art is incarnational and that incarnational art glorifies
God. In her essay, “Novelist and Believer,” Flannery O’Connor reminds us how our unlimited God
“has revealed himself specifically...the object of ultimate concern and He has a name.” As Christian
artists and writers, we’re excited about that. An incarnational work of art immerses its participant
in lived experience. Good art helps us to
know
, and can engage us in ways both subtle and effective.
Novelist Walker Percy suggests art speaks truth most effectively through its treatment of any
particular subject matter, rather than through the particulars of subject matter itself. For in that
treatment, the artist’s worldview is not only revealed, but experienced. “That is to say,” writes
Percy, “I do not conceive it my vocation to preach the Christian faith in a novel, but as it happens,
my worldview is informed by a certain belief about man’s nature and destiny which cannot fail to
be central to any novel I write.”
At the Cedarville Review, we believe good art is subtle in treatment. We believe good art mirrors
God’s own specificity. We believe good art creates a space to boldly examine the breadth of human
experience within the framework of God’s revelation.
Thank you for reading. We sincerely hope you enjoy your experience within.
In Christ,
The Editors